The author whose bestselling novel, "The Help," became an Oscar-winning film described her Southern upbringing to an appreciative audience at the Carmel Authors & Ideas Festival on Saturday.

In a casual, humor-laced monologue at Sunset Center, Kathryn Stockett addressed deeply rooted aspects of Southern culture that trouble her today as a critically thinking adult.

Stockett said she was educated at First Presbyterian Church Day School in her hometown of Jackson, Miss., where every subject was Jesus-driven, every textbook faith-based.

"My first science book made no mention of the big bang theory. Chapter One began, 'In the beginning, God created the heavens and the Earth,'" Stockett said. "When we got into history, everything was based on the Bible, and everything was taken literally: The Garden of Eden really existed. The burning bush was still burning out there somewhere. And when I finally had the sense to ask, 'Where are the dinosaurs in this story?' I was told that dinosaurs didn't exist. If they had, they would have been in the Bible.

"Imagine my surprise when I moved to New York City and wandered into the Museum of Natural History."

"The Help" tells the story of African-American domestic workers for Southern families, including her own, painting a painfully honest portrait of the way black people were treated in the 1970s South.

Her 20-minute talk Saturday centered around her own awakening to the reality that much of the Southern culture celebrated today is a shameful indictment of the way things were.

"I've come to realize that the South where I grew up is kind of ridiculous," she said. "And yet, I like to think about the way it used to be. I like it so much that I wrote about it for 500 pages. And the truth is, I kind of miss it. That's something I'm not supposed to say because it was very racist, very small-minded, very inconvenient."

Stockett said Southern culture taught her that Jesus was everywhere.

"He was in the school. He was in the home. We thanked him for the food we were about to eat. We prayed to him before we went to bed. And we gave him 10 percent of everything we earned," she said.

"I prayed for five years that someone would publish 'The Help,' and finally had to make a choice," Stockett said. "I could either be a good, tithing Christian, or I could get an agent. Turns out they cost about the same. Jesus did not get my book published."

Stockett remembers a South where the mail was delivered twice a day. Nobody had to take out the trash, she said, because there wasn't very much. Chickens were hard to eat because "they lived with you; they gave you eggs; they were your friends."

Southerners, she theorized, are predisposed to talk about each other. Small-town gossip and the local news went hand in hand, and the justification was, "Oh, it's only because we care, you know."

"It is the loneliest and most-peculiar feeling for a Southerner to know you are not being discussed," she said.

She recalled how black domestic workers were part of every household in her neighborhood, handling all the cooking and cleaning and taking care of the children.

"Our mothers and grandmothers were taught to treat the black domestics like family. They trusted them with the thing they cherished the most — their babies — and sometimes black women even nursed the babies," Stockett said. "And yet, they were not allowed to eat off the same plate, use the same fork, or the bathroom inside the home."

She recounted how domestic workers were handed down like property when their employers died. Tradition dictated they could not work for another family.

"Demetri, who worked for my family for 32 years, would stand me in front of the mirror and say, 'Look at yourself: Look at how beautiful you are, how smart you are.' She wanted me to know that, and it was something that went so far beyond what a paycheck could cover."

Stockett was part of a three-day program, concluding Sunday, that included almost three dozen authors and innovators. Saturday's lineup also featured radio talk-show host Dr. Brian Goldman, cognitive scientist Steve Joordens, jazz musician Mike Greensill and robotics scientist Homayoon Kazerooni.